The People We Were
by Puredeadthingy
Summary: AU Angels Unlimited/Agent Angel fic. Brice and Mel, golden couple, break up when Brice moves. However, he still finds ways to help her out.


1.

It is the second day of their move. Mother is snappier than usual, which Brice didn't think possible, and he is seventeen and lovelorn. Melanie is a continent and a half away, and cried for half an hour when he told her he was leaving. They promised to write every day, and call, and text, and email, and they would stick it out and right there he knew what it was to be adored and adore back.

He does not yet know that within two months he will be concentrating on his new life. Before he left he arranged for a fabulous bouquet of roses to be delivered to her door, and she is at this very moment receiving them. She has been crying; the scent soothes her blotchy skin, and for the first time in forty-eight hours she smiles.

2.

There is a website called Omegle where you can chat with total strangers. There are a lot of injokes—people organise on different sites and then see if they can find one another again through passwords and coded messages. Then you get the souls hungry for cybersex, and occasionally a joker without an agenda. Brice is surfing it, bored and monosyllabic, when the stranger he has just connected to tells him that 'you are beautiful 3 keep the chain going.'

It's hokey, but sweet; Brice does pass it along, and the chain keeps going for a week. When Mel logs onto Omegle for the first time three days later, someone tells her how beautiful she is; and, having felt ugly and sad all day because he hasn't sent her anything for a week, it has a positive little affect on her.

3.

He raves and raves about a columnist to a friend, who makes a blogpost about it; it gets a few links, but nothing special. The columnist in question tells you to live life to the fullest, and live it NOW. Lola enthuses about his words (which she found through several links) to Mel, and it gets her thinking. She has views. She has opinions. She wants to live freely.

She takes up photography, and drops it equally as quickly. Nude modelling for the art college, though? Easier, and she gets to chat with the professors. One suggests she come for a few shots in his studio. She does, and they turn out great. Filled with self-confidence, and an idea forming in her mind, she strides home.

Two months later, she leaves school.

4.

Drunk and happy to have escaped his little slice of hell, he goes out to a bar with some friends. They get hammered, so much so that when someone's girlfriend suggests releasing a helium balloon into the air they think it is an extremely profound suggestion. The balloon is golden and says 'HAPPY THIRTIETH!', but it will do.

A week later, Mel is on her way to an interview—if you can call it that—more of an audition, really. For Miaow! Magazine—a pseudo-lad mag who like their models scantily clothed. Mel is terrified. It's her first big job.

She sees the golden balloon bob along the surface of the canal, out of place on this dreary Wednesday morning, and suddenly giggles.

The panel like a vivacious girl; she gets it.

5.

He is SO DRUNK right now and it is THE BEST THING EVER. California is HOT and SUNNY and STAR-FILLED and EVERYTHING HOME WAS NOT.

He is at a strip club with his new colleagues, and the girls are lovely and tanned and slim. Brice looks and doesn't touch, and he tips well. His new co-workers aren't so graceful. Rob tries to feel a dancer up twice, and another keeps tipping with the money in his teeth. Drunk as he is, Brice still manages to give a speech about them doing what they have to for the job and not being pieces of meat.

Rob moves within a month and the first thing he sees at his new PR job is the file of glamour model Mel Beeby. Maybe before he would have had a quick wank and thrown her file out but he actually reads her stuff; and he's glad she did. She seems to be a level-headed woman. So she's signed, and soon her lingerie deal is announced. Mel is so overjoyed she buys her mum a new car.

6.

The meal is stilted and awkward. Lola has beautiful wing-style eyeliner on and deep berry lipstick. Mel has foundation, falsies, mascara, lipliner, lipstick, lip gloss, eyeshadow, white eyeliner, toner, and brown eyeliner on. She feels…fake. Brice looks down, embarrassed, and the conversation is terrible and about the weather.

She's not comfortable. Halfway through the main course, she excuses herself and goes to the toilets; she wipes off all her makeup and remerges with only some eyeshadow, lip balm, eyeliner and blush on. It's easier to connect to someone when you can see their face move.

Brice watches her face light up, animated, when Lola talks about selling some of her art. In fifteen minutes he falls in love again.


End file.
